Tootfinder

Sources: China has told some tech companies that it will approve Nvidia H200 chip purchases only under special circumstances, such as for university research (Qianer Liu/The Information)
https://www.theinformation.com/articles/china-restric…

China Restricts Nvidia Chip Purchases to Special Circumstances
The Chinese government this week told some tech companies it would only approve their purchases of Nvidia’s H200 AI chips under special circumstances, such as for university research and development labs, according to two people with direct knowledge of the situation. The latest communication ...

The fracturing of the Dutch far-right, after Wilder's reminded everyone that bigots are bad at compromise, is definitely a relief. Dutch folks I've talked to definitely see D66 as progressive, <strike>so there's no question this is a hard turn to the left (even if it's not a total flip to the far-left)</strike> a lot of folks don't agree. I'm going to let the comments speak rather than editorialize myself..
While this is a useful example of how a democracy can be far more resilient to fascism than the US, that is, perhaps, not the most interesting thing about Dutch politics. The most interesting thing is something Dutch folks take for granted and never think of as such: there are two "governments."
The election was for the Tweede Kamer. This is a house of representatives. The Dutch use proportional representation, so people can (more or less) vote for the parties they actually want. Parties <strike>rarely</strike> never actually get a ruling majority, so they have to form coalition governments. This forces compromise, which is something Wilders was extremely bad at. He was actually responsible for collapsing the coalition his party put together, which triggered this election... and a massive loss of seats for his party.
Dutch folks do still vote strategically, since a larger party has an easier time building the governing coalition and the PM tends to come from the largest party. This will likely be D66, which is really good for the EU. D66 has a pretty radical plan to solve the housing crisis, and it will be really interesting to see if they can pull it off. But that's not the government I want to talk about right now.
In the Netherlands, failure to control water can destroy entire towns. A good chunk of the country is below sea level. Both floods and land reclamation have been critical parts of Dutch history. So in the 1200's or so, the Dutch realized that some things are too important to mix with normal politics.
You see, if there's an incompetent government that isn't able to actually *do* anything (see Dick Schoof and the PVV/VVD/NSC/BBB coalition) you don't want your dikes to collapse and poulders to flood. So the Dutch created a parallel "government" that exists only to manage water: waterschap or heemraadschap (roughly "Water Board" in English). These are regional bureaucracies that exist only to manage water. They exist completely outside the thing we usually talk about as a "government" but they have some of the same properties as a government. They can, for example, levy taxes. The central government contributes funds to them, but lacks authority over them. Water boards are democratically elected and can operate more-or-less independent of the central government.
Controlling water is a common problem, so water boards were created to fulfill the role of commons management. Meanwhile, so many other things in politics run into the very same "Tragedy of the Commons" problems. The right wing solution to commons management is to let corporations ruin everything. The left-state solution is to move everything into the government so it can be undermined and destroyed by the right. The Dutch solution to this specific problem has been to move commons management out of the domain of the central government into something else.
And when I say "government" here, I'm speaking more to the liberal definition of the term than to an anarchist definition. A democratically controlled authority that facilitates resource management lacks the capacity for coercive violence that anarchists define as "government." (Though I assume they might leverage police or something if folks refuse to pay their taxes, but I can't imagine anyone choosing not to.)
As the US federal government destroys the social fabric of the US, as Trump guts programs critical to people's survival, it might be worth thinking about this model. These authorities weren't created by any central authority, they evolved from the people. Nothing stops Americans from building similar institutions that are both democratic and outside of the authority of a government that could choose to defund and abolish them... nothing but the realization that yes, you actually can.
#USPol #NLPol

Great to see @… running with #ProtocolsForPublishers
Chad is a huge open protocols advocate, and fortunately he's not completely engineering brained and has been spending time at the Internet Governance Forum and other important venues that are m…

Sources: China told some local tech companies to temporarily halt purchase orders for Nvidia's H200 chips while officials deliberate on import conditions (Qianer Liu/The Information)
https://www.theinformation.com/articles/china-tells-tech-…

China Tells Tech Companies to Halt Nvidia H200 Chip Orders
The Chinese government this week asked some tech companies to temporarily halt plans to buy Nvidia’s H200 AI chips, according to two people involved in the communication, throwing up a possible roadblock in Nvidia’s hopes of restarting chip sales to one of its biggest markets. The instruction ...

Don't get whipsawed by the overwhelming amount of cybersecurity news. Check out today's Metacurity for a concise rundown of the critical infosec developments you should know, including
--Former defense firm GM pleads guilty to selling cyber exploits to Russia,
--Nation-state hackers breached key US telecom services firm Ribbon Communications for nearly a year,
--US government agencies back bid to ban TP-Link routers,
--Hacktivists breached Canadian critical inf…

Former defense firm GM pleads guilty to selling cyber exploits to Russian broker
Nation-state hackers breached key US telecom services firm Ribbon Communications for nearly a year, US government agencies back bid to ban TP-Link routers, Hacktivists breached Canadian critical infrastructure, Python Foundation rejected US grants that required DEI deletions, much more

There were actually a lot of good recommendations from that Committee report, the one on PR was just the final one! Here's a few more.. including some that local #Fediverse proponents could dig into! @… was on the Committee.
—>FEDI ADVANTAGE<— “The Committee heard about a number of issues related to
the electoral information environment. Members recommend
that the provincial government collaborate with Elections
BC and the federal government to review existing legislative
and regulatory measures related to misinformation,
disinformation, and hate speech during elections, including
**mechanisms to ensure the timely removal of harmful content** (**emphasis added)”
—> FEDI ADVANTAGE<— “To better address challenges associated with social media and emergent technologies such as artificial intelligence, Members recommend establishing a working group to propose amendments to BC’s privacy and election legislation. To better protect all users, the Committee recommends requiring digital platforms to act with a duty of care and establish clear safety-related requirements such as data privacy, platform design, and content policy. The Committee also heard about concerns regarding foreign interference, and recommends that these be considered by the Electoral Integrity Working Group.”
—The Committee heard about the critical importance of
civic education to ensure the public’s understanding of
democratic institutions, processes, and participation. The
Committee recommends strengthening civic education
in the K-12 school system with input from experts and a
greater emphasis on applied learning.
— the Committee suggests enhancing data collection by requiring proactive enumeration on an annual basis and ensuring that registered parties and candidates can access poll-by-poll results. Elections BC should review and improve
voter registration practices and communication, as well as
access to and public awareness of voting opportunities. With respect to expanding voter eligibility, the Committee supports further examination of extending voting rights to 16- and 17-year-olds as well as permanent residents in BC.
— Committee Members recommend modernizing the candidate nominator verification process, requiring Elections BC to collect and share voters’ contact information with registered political parties and candidates, and strengthening measures related to access to multi-unit buildings for candidates and their campaigns.
Full report to the Legislature: #BCPoli #CanPoli #CdnPoli #ElectoralReform #Democracy #ProportionalRepresentation #Polarization

The implications are interesting enough when we apply this to systems like capitalism or national governments, but there are other very interesting implications when applied to systems like race or gender.
Like, as a cis man the only way I can be free to express and explore my own masculinity is if the masculinity I participate in is one which allows anyone the freedom to leave. Then I have an obligation to recognize the validity of nom-masculine trans identity as a necessary component of my own. If I fail to do this, then I trap myself in masculinity and allow the system to control me rather than me to be a free participant in the system.
But if it's OK to escape but not enter, that's it's own restriction that constrains the freedom to leave. It creates a barrier that keeps people in by the fear that they cannot return. So in order for me to be free in my cis masculine identity, I must accept non-masculine trans identities as they are and accept detransitioning as also valid.
But I also need to accept trans-masc identities because restricting entry to my masculinity means non-consensually constraining other identities. If every group imposes an exclusion against others coming in, that, by default, makes it impossible to leave every other group. This is just a description of how national borders work to trap people within systems, even if a nation itself allows people to "freely" leave.
So then, a free masculinity is one which recognizes all configurations of trans identities as valid and welcomes, if not celebrates, people who transition as affirmations of the freedom of their own identity (even for those who never feel a reason to exercise that same freedom).
The most irritating type of white person may look at this and say, "oh, so then why can't I be <not white>?" Except that the critique of transratial identities has never been "that's not allowed" and has always been "this person didn't do the work." If that person did the work, they would understand that the question doesn't make sense based on how race is constructed. That person might understand that race, especially whiteness, is more fluid than they at first understood. They might realize that whiteness is often chosen at the exclusion of other racialized identities. They would, perhaps, realize that to actually align with any racialized identity, they would first have to understand the boot of whiteness on their neck, have to recognize the need to destroy this oppressive identity for their own future liberation. The best, perhaps only, way to do this would be to use the privilege afforded by that identity to destroy it, and in doing so would either destroy their own privilege or destroy the system of privilege. The must either become themselves completely ratialized or destroy the system of race itself such being "transracial" wouldn't really make sense anymore.
But that most annoying of white person would, of course, not do any such work. Nevertheless, one hopes that they may recognize the paradox that they are trapped by their white identity, forced forever by it to do the work of maintaining it. And such is true for all privileged identities, where privilege is only maintained through restrictions where these restrictions ultimately become walls that imprison both the privileged and the marginalized in a mutually reinforcing hell that can only be escaped by destroying the system of privilege itself.

This is particularly bad in #Italy, where #WhatsApp is the default means of communication. In other countries I've lived in at least they consider alternatives. In Italy people don't even ask you if you have an account before adding you in school parent groups or contacting you for work over WhatsApp.

Why people don’t demand data privacy – even as governments and corporations collect more personal information
How people talk about data privacy can overcome – or reinforce – their skepticism that things can change.

“[open social] must be funded like infrastructure, not consumer apps. In fact, given the scale of hybrid threats, it should be funded from defense budgets, not innovation leftovers.
The strategic layer of democracy is the information layer. And right now, it is outsourced.” @seabass.bsky.social
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The US Supreme Court hears arguments in a copyright case between ISP Cox Communications and record labels; labels say Cox should be liable for user infringement (Blake Brittain/Reuters)
https://www.reuters.com/legal/government/u